State Auto seeking incentive to add jobs downtown

State Automobile Mutual Insurance Co. wants to move into the 175 on the Park office building next to Columbus Commons downtown, which could create a big vacancy at the Smith Brothers Hardware Co. building.

Columbus has offered the insurer a Downtown Office Incentive valued at $233,250 over five years as State Auto contemplates leasing 54,000 square feet in the building at 175 S. Third St. State Auto, based at 518 E. Broad St., has proposed signing a seven-year lease and creating 46 new jobs downtown while retaining 809, according to city documents.

“We’re working with City Council on a plan that will help us determine where to locate a portion of our nearly 1,000 Central Ohio associates,” State Auto spokesman Kyle Anderson wrote in an email to Columbus Business First. “We have reached capacity in our corporate headquarters on East Broad Street and require space that accommodates our plans for growth.”

The city incentive would return an amount equal to half of the personal income taxes generated by the new jobs, which will pay between $30,600 and $155,800. The deal may receive a first reading before City Council as early as Nov. 21 and a final vote Dec. 5.

State Auto’s move into 175 on the Park likely would mean the insurer vacates much if not all of the 52,000 square feet it has leased for nine years at the Smith Brothers building on North Fourth Street. Its lease there expires in September 2012.

Capitol Equities Realty Ltd. broker Todd Kemmerer, the marketer of Smith Brothers, said he hopes State Auto consolidates other operations downtown and fills some space in the building.

“Smith Brothers will be impacted in some way,” he said. “I don’t know how much.”